Backing Boris to win next year's election? Fancy yourself as a hip fashion designer? Then you're in luck: the mayor's campaign team has just launched a competition to craft a pro-Bozza T-shirt.
Yes, just come up with a clever idea, send it in, and your design could be chosen as the official garment of Boris' re-election bid. But that's not all! The winner will also have their photo taken with the Mayor while he's wearing the shirt, and the winning design will be sold online to "help the campaign raise money". So they're basically relying on unpaid labour instead of getting a professional to do the job. Royalties? Forget it, pal, just be happy with your souvenir snap.
Scouting out the rest of backboris2012.com, (the new online home after the last one was hijacked by persons unknown last year), it seems that the campaign team think merchandise is the surefire way toward winning that second term. Beyond the T-shirt comp, the site will shortly be selling a range of Boris parephernalia, including umbrellas, Oyster card holders, and cufflinks. The Conservative candidate is leaving his Labour counterpart in the dust when it comes to official merch: there's nothing, not even a Maggie Thatcher fright-mask or "two terms good, three terms better" beach towel on Ken Livingstone's official website. In the branding stakes, Boris has already got this one sewn up.
Speaking of which...neither site will be selling the best bits of electoral ephemera we've seen yet: these knitted versions of the two candidates, as lovingly crafted by Heather Brown, wife of Londonist editor M@.
